ing-place in a retired part of the town-it conviction I worked on, at the same time
was a house for the rich, and the rich were looking constantly about me, hoping to dis-
there abiding. Leading the way into the cover, if possible, some other way in which I
parlour, the lady said-
might employ myself. But I was looking
"Remember, this is now your home; if vainly-every avenue seemed closed against
you seek another, I am to seek it with you. me-every vacancy I could fill seemed to be
To-night your canvass shall be brought here, filled by a special Providence almost at the
and you shall paint-a likeness of myself, very hour I applied. It was at this time
if you choose. There is a room just above when I was most desponding, that a gentle-
this furnished with excellent light. We man, who had befriended me in several ways,
will have no terrible scene painting like THE began to specially commiserate my situation.
FLOOD, nor even like THE WEAVERS; I will The winter was drawing to a close, and I
have you paint fairy-land for me. I have had not, by any labor, managad to make
not often had my own way as yet; I am enough to pay my way, and I was about to
wilful now because I have an opportunity. return again to my mother, and to compel
You shall have your own way, too." myself at once to less aspiring occupations-

You said you were a poet?" said the to some business that would pay, however
old man, signifying, by his question, his humble. This old gentleman friend of mine,
desire to hear that confession she had pro-
commiserated my position thus:
mised. Without a word of preface she be-
gan, and uninterrupted by a word of com-
ment, related her story to its close.

"He had formed a most charitable design in his own mind. He had a friend, a widower, who had commissioned him to select "My father died, and I was a spoiled child, for him a wife, and bearing in mind my a wonder, and a pet no longer. My mother poverty, and comparative friendlessness, he was beautiful, and very gifted and young; immediately conceived the idea of giving to she never suffered me to stand in awe of her me a lawful protector. His work was so authority; we love each other too well: we skillfully done, that I had not the least suswere sisters, playmates, friends, until my picion of it until it was no longer progressive, father's death, when a dreadful, dreadful but completed. The widower was childless, change came over her. When it was neces- and older than I, but a good, and rather dissary for us to go to work-being in poverty tinguished, and very wealthy man. We -we did go, but my strength outlasted hers; married five years ago, and since our wedshe became ill, and sad, and faint-hearted, ding-day have lived in this place. You and she had sorrows greater than you have think my name unfortunate? It is not; for known, if one may judge by effect. When we lived happily together until he was taken a friend invited me to come to this city, say-away. Since then, my mother has been with ing that here something might be found for me, and her name, too, is Isidore. You will me to do, I came, leaving mamma at home love the name again when you know her, for ill, but hopeful for me, if not for herself. she is truly angelic." She was with friends, and I was going to friends, so we were, perhaps, after all, to be considered fortunate. But my friend who had called me was also poor; she could her- been great and extraordinary, and she has self do nothing for me but give me a shelter borne them so patiently, that they have alfor a season under her roof. She had faith most made an angel of her." in me that I would make a great poet, and "Tell me why is it that you have insisted the praise of friends had made me self-con- upon my coming here? The whole perfident. But though the powerful were most formance is too wild! what does it mean? kind to me, and judged my doings with You and I have confided our secret story to lenient eyes of criticism, it was plainly to each other, strangers a week ago! What be seen that I had not then reached a com- has passed us? I think I had better go manding position. With this discouraging away; I'm either dreaming, or living when

"As are you."

"No, no, not I. But her sorrows have

I had better be dead, after I have got into which gave back no echo to the footstepmy dotage."

couches, where one might sleep, and dream, "This is what it means: God has brought of all things beautiful but-death. The old us to each other. Perhaps you'll think I'm man paused as he stood within the door dreaming now, when I tell you what I'm Was it his miserable raiment that caused him going to; but as truly as I have a soul to to hesitate, fearful of appearing before the save, it all happened. When my father was luxurious invalid in such a plight? It may dying, he said—and it makes no difference have been this; but Isidore gave him no to you or me whether his mind was wander- time for indulging in these, or in any reing at the time-Daughter, if you ever find flections. She brought him to her mother's in this world an old man, lonely and poor, bedside, and said, "Here is my friend, but good and great, love him, and do for him mamma; do you feel equal to a little conaccording as God has done for you." And versation, now?"

he made me swear that I would carry pity| The lady bowed her head graciously to the and love in my heart for all the living; but new comer, tenderly to her child, and as more especially for the old and lonely, and much of curiosity as she was capable of feelgood man. Father you are he: I found you ing, in her then weak state, was very plainly living under a weight of bitter recollections; revealed as her eyes turned towards the poor henceforward, you must live without them; old man. She had been a handsome woman you shall find only peace and comfort here. in her day; but her beauty was very different Believe what I have told you; my father from the pure loveliness that lay as a conloved my mother with the most impassioned secration on the human nature of her devotion, and perhaps he saw into the future widowed child. She had been a worldly. as the dying can, I believe, and he knew woman, vain, and, perhaps, weak, but not how she would some time stand in need of after a common weakness; for the most of all the consolations of the great and good; her life had been a furious combat, and she help me in my watching over my paralyzed was never conquered until her idolized husmother. I fear-I know-that she has not band was laid in the grave. Then, her long to stay with me, and she desires to go; health began to fall, and a depression and a believe that the work of your ministry is not yet finished; stay with me, at least least"

at

"Daughter, say no more; I would fain go, even now, to your mother."

sorrow, such as death and loss never occasioned, sprang up into life, which had grown deeper and darker until this present hour-which was constantly growing deeper and darker, and undermining life, and insuring the easy victory of death.

His voice had been faint, faltering, the voice of age, till now; but, when he ex- Her face was haggard, and her eves had pressed this wish, he had been gazing so the wild glare of a lunatic, as they wandered long, and with such earnestness, upon young from the old man to her daughter: it was Isidore, that he seemed to have drawn with- hard to engage her, or to interest her in in himself, from her presence, the spirit of conversation, though, almost from the molife, and his voice had the clarion strength ment of intering the room the stranger's and clearness of early manhood. lips had been unsealed, and he spoke as Word was sent into the chamber of the never man spoke in the hearing of those invalid that the daughter and a friend were women before-of life and death, of excomming to pass the Sabbath twilight with perience, and change; at first, Isidore bore her; and, a few minutes after, Isidore led part in the conversation, but not long, for her aged friend into the room where the in the argument he conducted he needed no faint daylight was struggling with the night. aid. For more than an hour that mighty strain The place was very cheerfully, as the apart of eloquence rolled from the soul of the old ment of an invalid should be. Comfort and man through the sick chamber, and it was luxury were there; the fragrance of flowers, while in the full tide of thought and expresand the twittering of a bird-a carpet, sion that the human voice suddenly broke,

and the strength of the speaker waned: arrayed in greenery, shaded by lofty old then he arose, walking through the chamber, hedges, beech-trees, alders, or willows, leadnow quiet wrapt in shadows, he bowed at ing to some quiet cot or farmhouse, or range the sick woman's beside more lowly than of pasture-lands; and often leading on courtesy demanded, for he bowed to pray! merely to some other green lane, or series of And, surely, never was a prayer like that lanes, branching off to right or left, which breathed in the ear of Heaven! Was it for are there seemingly without any other purthe life of her who was chained by the un- pose than that they are there, to feast the conquerable power to that couch? for the eyes of country strollers with the sight of happiness of her whose name was breathed their quiet green beauty. through every several petition? No; but it The green lane is the delight of our poets was her pardon that he whispered, and for and our artists, and of all who love rural her forgiveness that he besought high scenery. Cowper, Hunt, and Wordsworth Heaven! And while he was dying of his have painted them in words; and our living emotion, dying because there was now really, painters, Creswick, Lee, Witherington, and as he had yesterday unwisely said "No Redgrave, have painted them in colours. more use for him on earth," (God took him No pictures are more admired than theirs when he had breathed his pardon in the ears on the walls of the academy. But they can of the wretched woman, whom God's ven- only give us charming "bits," whereas the geance, through her own conscience, had pedestrian can range along miles of charovertaken in the last years of her life); the ming lanes, even in the very neighbourhood soul of the forgiven-the repentant, took of this crowded metropolis. Leigh Hunt also his departure. can point out a favourite route along green And thus vengeance and mercy were lanes in the neighbourhood of Hampstead, satisfied, expiation and satisfaction gave in which takes a long day to visit. Wordstheir holy verdict, and the young Isidore worth has sung that the fields and rural lanes was left alone to ponder, in no dreaming were his "favourite schools." Indeed, his mood of poesy, on the two lives, divided, poetry is full of the sweet breath of the united which had proved in themselves that country. even to the wretched and lonely come no Step out of the dusty highway into the superfluous years. At last comes always a green lane. How cool and quiet it is! revelation, which does away with mystery. Pleasantly it winds on among the farms You will say this is a fantasy. What if and fields. A gentle breeze stirs the tree I can show you the two graves, and the two tops, on the summit of one of which the monuments that rise above that husband and throstle is pouring out his sweet music. that wife? Will not the "other Book" But for the feathered singers, the cloisterwhich shall be opened, prove the Revelator shade of the green lane were bathed in of secrets such as the most daring of im- stillness. The sun, as it streams through maginations never conceived? Wait and the young fan-like foilage of the trees, turns

see!

THE GREEN LANE.

them to green and gold-the bright livery of spring. The gentle wind kisses the leaves as it passes, by with a faint rustle and THERE are no green lanes in the world murmur, which still enables you to hear the equal to those of England. Italy has its brushing of your feet over the grassy path. skies, Greece its classic ruins, Egypt its Flowers are peeping out from the hedgepyramids, Switzerland its Alps, Germany its bottoms. The violet is modestly lifting up Rhine, America its Niagara, but none of its head, and shedding abroad its delicate these has a green lane such as we have odour even where unseen. The bees have thousands of in England. The green lane already begun their year's work, and are is essentially English, and is confined to grappling with the hawthorn blossoms and England. There are green lanes neither in the wild roses of the hedgerows. The sward Scotland nor Ireland-we mean grassy roads is covered with daisies; and fox-glove, prim

roses, and blue-bells covered the banks by waters tempting the stroller to uncoil the the lane side. An open space appears, rusty chain and fetch up a bumper cool as covered with gorse, full of golden bloom. the polar ice. Nothing can be more gay and beautiful.

These cottages look really pleasant and Sometimes the lane is quite overshadowed rural; the cluster of lilacs nodding over by tall trees, which make a green twilight, mossy roofs, with those branching oaks, but through which the slanting sun's rays loftier still, through which the thin blue shoot down here and there, lighting up the smoke slowly eddies upwards into the bluer patches of grass beneath. How bright the sky. There is also an elder-tree growing by leaves through which the sun's light trem- the wicket, near the entrance to the cotbles. What variety of tints, from the cool tager's garden, and no cottage-garden would green to the golden yellow, and the rich be complete without an elder. And there amber brown of the tree stems! With is a cottager at work, turning over the soil a pool of water in the foreground, or a with his spade, which tinkles against the bright cool stream leaping or trickling from pebbles as he delves the dry earth, making the bank, and straggling irregularly across it ready for some summer crop. Move back into the lane again, and as the path, you have before you one of those delicious "bits" of woodland or green-lane you proceed, lo! a patient ass stands before scenery which Creswick so loves to paint. you, listlessly mediating. No green lane The green lane is generally quiet and without its ass! Does the ass love green lonely, but sometimes there is life about it lanes for their quiet, or for their sweet her-the life of the fields. Hist! 'Tis the bage? Either way the ass must be an anilowing of the cow, strayed from the adjoin- mal of taste, much-reviled brute as it is. ing field, tempted by the sweet daisied But this poor ass bears upon it the marks of sward of the lane. She has raised her head, hard work, of blows, of poor feeding. It is and is lowing to her fellow across the ad- not a luxurious, idle, dissipated ass, but a joining hedge, who is standing udder-deep common day-labouring ass, the servant of in the rich grass and golden butter-cups. tinkers and gipsies. There they are, camped Or, there is a flock of geese in the lane, out in the green

lane!

watched by a little fellow with red cheeks "Will you have your fortune read?" and flaxen locks, who amuses himself by Then have it read here in the green lane, making whistles out of reeds, and occasional by that bold tawny girl, with blazing black clay-pies and other dainties in the runnel eyes-a genuine gipsy, a true child of the that bustles along under the hedge side. East. Since Squire Western had his fortune Farther on, you overtake an old man lean- told in the green lane, as related in Tom Jones, ing on his staff. He has crawled forth into these same strollers have been haunting the the green lane to rejoice, as he still can re- lanes of England. The lanes are the campjoice, in its quiet life and beauty. He is not ing ground of the gipsies; there they mend far from home; a rude style points out the pots and manufacture brooms; there they path across a field, and there, within sight, cook, eat, marry, and bring up children. is a little cluster of cottages, rose-embowered The gipsy child, brought up in the green and suckle-wreathed, with bees about them; lanes, is no more to be tied down to the old women peep out from the doors, and the plodding life of towns, than, is the Amerimerry voices of children rise up from the can Indian to become a cotton planter for a The gipsy is the grassy spaces near at hand, where they are Yankee slave-owner. at play. And here is the spring-well of the Indian of Europe-not to be civilised, any hamlet, close at hand, from which a cottage more than the green lane itself could flourish

in the Strand.

The green lane is beautiful at all seasons. In spring it is youthful and fresh. In summer it is rich and luscious. In autumn its

girl draws her can full of water, and shily tips over the style and away across the field, out of the stranger's sight. The well is nooked in a leafy, lush recess, fern-fringed and mossy to the bottom; its clear bubbling beauty is ripe and full. The fresh green of

the lane in the young spring is delicious; antique statues in the royal collections.but yet, for richness of colour, for brilliant However, whether he studied at Rome or not, tints, deep browns, lit up with the scarlet he became an excellent painter, and was and red berries with which the hedgerows employed by the King to execute several are full in autumn, we have even a pre-historical pictures, which raised his reputaference for the latter season. But always tion throughout his own country, and these is the green lane beautiful. And in sum- being afterwards sent to Rome as a present mer, when the delicious fragrance from the to the Pope, so pleased the Italians, that hay-fields fills the lane, and heavy-laden they called him a second Paul Veronese. wains come swinging along the grass path, The style of painting adopted by Murillo the scent filling the summer air, a walk in was his own. He copied his objects from the lane is an inexpressible source of delight. nature, but combined them ideally. He There is a life among the fields at that sea-painted for most of the principal churches in son also, such as you rarely witness at other Seville, Granada, Cadiz, and Cordova, and times. The mowers are at work, and the his smaller works were widely dispersed haymakers are busy in their wake, casting throughout Spain. His paintings in the about the drying hay, amidst laughter, and jesting, and merry glee.

churches of Seville are exceedingly large, some of them eighteen feet high, and conBut the pleasures of the green lane at all taining an immense number of figures, as is seasons are endless. In the early morning, required in such subjects as "Christ feeding at glowing noon, or in the balmy eve, when the multitude, "St. John preaching,” “St. the sun sets in gold, dimly seen through Thomas giving alms to the poor,” etc., etc. overarching trees, the lane is always delight- Although these pictures are skilfully wrought ful. It calls up the poetry of our nature, out, they are in many instances marred by and quickens it to life; and we feel as if we could only enjoy it thoroughly to the accompaniment of volume of Keats, or Tennyson, or Wordsworth. This love of green lanes is a truly national attachment. It is a simple and delightful taste, and we are not ashamed of it. The love of country and of country by the gentleness of their color and the life is rather our pride and our glory.

MURILLO.

--

MURILLO, perhaps the most pleasing painter Spain ever produced, was born at Pilas, near Seville, in the year 1613. At an early age he displayed such taste and aptitude for painting, that his uncle took him into his studio; but his principal knowledge was derived from the renowned painter, Velasquez, who directed his studies, and even frequently retouched his designs.

an expression of mean character in the most dignified personages. However, in the amiable and tender sentiments which are expressed by the silent actions of the human features, he was eminently successful, and his pictures generally captivate the beholder

softness of their execution.

As an artist, he is generally considered to have most completely succeeded in his small pictures of familiar life. His favourite subjects were beggar-boys, taken from life in different actions and amusements.

Murillo enjoyed his great renown to the advanced age of 72, when he died, universally lamented by those who felt any interest in the art.

"Let not sleep," says Pythagoras, “fall upon thine eyes till thou hast thrice reviewed the transactions of the past day. Many writers affirm that Murillo journeyed Where have I turned aside from rectitude? to Italy, and studied at Rome; but Velasco, What have I been doing? What have I a Spanish author, affirms that he never was left undone that I ought to have done? in Italy. and that he attained his great per- Begin thus from the first act, and proceed; fection in the art by copying Titian, Rubens, and in conclusion, at the ill which thou and Vandyke, at Madrid, and in the palace hast done be troubled, and rejoice for the of the Escurial; and also by studying the good."